That would be me, assuming reasonable values of "swim fast" and "successfully." But I may be a serious outlier, so YMMV.

http://s194.beta.photobucket.com/....html?sort=3&o=0 shows me doing a 100yd sprint from a wall start in about :57, using 19-21 strokes per length. I think my stroke rate approached 100spm at points. It may look like crappy swimming, but I have been beaten out of the water in my AG in a race about twice in the past decade (and both were in the only half IMs I did). I feel fine out of the water, and can hammer the bike/run immediately.

I started swimming at age 26 (wow, more than a quarter century ago!), and had a ridiculously high turnover from the very beginning. While I started out with masters swimming, I only once was over 20,000yds in a given week those first years. I only swim about three times per week these days, (Sunday was 3200scy, yesterday was 2300scy), but every set I do is done as hard as I can do it.

I see a number of types of swimmers in my morning group:

- Ex-swimmers: lower turnover, lots of kicking, excellent streamlining, long glide off the wall, fast
- Ex-Channel swimmer: high turnover, lots of kicking (but she's short), fast
- triathletes: low turnover, too much glide, crappy leg position, slow
- me: no glide, no kick, high turnover, "fast"

I typically hold 20-22 strokes per 25yd length, and hold 1:15s or better for intervals up to 500 (did 11:59 for 1000 this year, though). That's about 80spm.

To improve your turnover without losing speed, you really have to focus on correct and efficient catch and pull: no slipping the hand/arm through the water. I probably give up some of the finish, but that isn't the most important part of the stroke.

Most distance swimmers I know can hold their fastest practice 100 speed + about 5 sec or so, which for you would be about 1:02.//

I think you are off in your assessment of what an all out 100 vs a 1000 pace are. Keep in mind we are talking about masters athletes that swim around 10k a week or so, not college swimmers doing 100+k per week and 19 years old. Lets take one of the best sprinters in the world and also a world class distance swimmer. Phelps can probably swim about a 41 or so for 100 yards. By your calculation he should be able to hold 46's for a 1000. That would be a 7;40+. Now if you are a swimmer you know how ridiculous this swim is. So if the fastest guy in the world is not even close and a top 55 top swimmer is not even close, who is it that you know holds a 5 second gap?


Not saying there is not someone, but it is going to be very rare. Even Jordan who i consider a non swimmer who has built up tremendous endurance with absolutely no speed will not fit. I think he went about a 58 100 and then did a 10;59 1000. That is about the closest guy i can think of and he is about an 8 second spread. And he did both those time in the same swim meet..

For the record, I'm 57 and swim about 30,000 yds/wk.//

Hey, where were you when we did out 1000tt for swim smooth? Now we have our last guy for a 4 man relay, You, half speed and i all 57, and the youngster ken will be in our AG in a couple weeks. And i missed the part where you said workout 100, and i know ken would agree with me that he would not swim any 53. At our age we often swim out best time in workouts, and he maybe gets another second+ for the dive, but that would probably be it. That 1000 he did was a great swim, it was 2nd only to halfspeed's 11;30+. Ya, i still think even the workout 100tt is not a 5 second predictor of a 1000 time. I think a get out workout swim would just be a second or two slower than a race 100, so in the 7 and on up to 15 seconds would be the range.


Thinking back to my last masters meet where i swam both, i was about 59 and 12;18 for the two swims. in workouts the best i can do is about a 1;01 and in that workout 1000 i did a 12;36, so a pretty big gap for me. If you want to spank someone, it should be me!! (-; I seem to be able to do ok on OW race days, so go figure..

Monty - You missed the "fastest practice 100 speed" part. Ken said he did the 57 from a wall start in practice, which I took as starting in the water, so probably he could go 53-ish if rested and off the blocks in a meet, which would translate to about a 9-sec gap between the all-out 100 and 1000 if he went 10:20 on his 1000. Eric Vendt's record for the 1000 is 8:36 or 51.6/100. I have no idea what he can do for an all-out 100 free but 42.6 doesn't seem unreasonable for a distance guy like him. James Bonney told me his best 100 free was 46.0 vs his best 1000 at about 9:10. So, a 9 sec diff comparing absolute best 100 free times but about 5 sec diff using best 100 practice times.

I like stuff like this, even though, truthfully it has no merit ; ) I just like hearing what guys do in practice.

So about Vendt: Indisputable fastest practice swimmer of all time. Set of 400 IMs on 4:15, went under 3:50 on all of them 3:43 on the last one. The time he swam CW with Phelps was interesting. Other than kick sets his send offs were considerably faster than Phelps. You probably already know this, but Phelps and Garret Weber Gale are the kings of the kick board. I know Phelps did 50 x 100's on 1:15 (maybe, I don't know interval actually) and went under 1:00 on all of them. WTF. And he doesn't look like he is trying on a board. It's just, I don't know, weird to see. It looks like he is getting pulled by a stretch cord.

Now to the question at hand:

Several months ago I started a thread about how most of the US National team does a majority of their training in SCY - not LCM. Ehh, I don't want to start that debate again but for what it is worth: If you want to swim with a SR in the 80's you need to train with your SR in the 80's. And doing long slow swims in a long course pool - or worse OW - will not allow you to develop the strength and endurance to do that. If you are swimming a 1000 straight and by the end of the 1000 your SR has deteriorated 10%, then you wasted 10 minutes (well probably more like 15) of training time. You should have done 10 x 100's and keep your SR rate high for all 40 lengths.

Grande Pelota: the conclusions drawn in the blog you reference are dubious. Obviously the writer was correct about the most powerful part of the stroke - basically when the hand is from lower chest to hip - but they ignore the competing force: drag. Studies have been done to show that a swimmer is traveling fastest when the hand is out front, and they are going their slowest when their hand is in the power positions. This is simply due to the drag that is created when your hand is in exit phase of your stroke. You wrote that swimmers need to "let go" and get their hands to the power position sooner and more often. I am not sure what you are advocating, but if you are saying "short up front, long out the back," well solid research has concluded that is faulty.

Grande Pelota: the conclusions drawn in the blog you reference are dubious. Obviously the writer was correct about the most powerful part of the stroke - basically when the hand is from lower chest to hip - but they ignore the competing force: drag. Studies have been done to show that a swimmer is traveling fastest when the hand is out front, and they are going their slowest when their hand is in the power positions. This is simply due to the drag that is created when your hand is in exit phase of your stroke. You wrote that swimmers need to "let go" and get their hands to the power position sooner and more often. I am not sure what you are advocating, but if you are saying "short up front, long out the back," well solid research has concluded that is faulty.

I'm curious, what should a normal, "front pack" triathlete be able to do for the 1000? I would have thought Jordan was slower than 11:00. That article by Jesse Thomas a while ago suggested he had a hard time breaking 12 and he seems to have no problem staying with the lead pack most of the time.

I hope people keep perpetuating the dumb idea if high stroke rate because it will substantially increase any advantage that real swimmers have, and it will make for cool splash photos at mass swim starts!

I like stuff like this, even though, truthfully it has no merit ; ) I just like hearing what guys do in practice.

So about Vendt: Indisputable fastest practice swimmer of all time. Set of 400 IMs on 4:15, went under 3:50 on all of them 3:43 on the last one. The time he swam CW with Phelps was interesting. Other than kick sets his send offs were considerably faster than Phelps. You probably already know this, but Phelps and Garret Weber Gale are the kings of the kick board. I know Phelps did 50 x 100's on 1:15 (maybe, I don't know interval actually) and went under 1:00 on all of them. WTF. And he doesn't look like he is trying on a board. It's just, I don't know, weird to see. It looks like he is getting pulled by a stretch cord.

Now to the question at hand:

Several months ago I started a thread about how most of the US National team does a majority of their training in SCY - not LCM. Ehh, I don't want to start that debate again but for what it is worth: If you want to swim with a SR in the 80's you need to train with your SR in the 80's. And doing long slow swims in a long course pool - or worse OW - will not allow you to develop the strength and endurance to do that. If you are swimming a 1000 straight and by the end of the 1000 your SR has deteriorated 10%, then you wasted 10 minutes (well probably more like 15) of training time. You should have done 10 x 100's and keep your SR rate high for all 40 lengths.

Grande Pelota: the conclusions drawn in the blog you reference are dubious. Obviously the writer was correct about the most powerful part of the stroke - basically when the hand is from lower chest to hip - but they ignore the competing force: drag. Studies have been done to show that a swimmer is traveling fastest when the hand is out front, and they are going their slowest when their hand is in the power positions. This is simply due to the drag that is created when your hand is in exit phase of your stroke. You wrote that swimmers need to "let go" and get their hands to the power position sooner and more often. I am not sure what you are advocating, but if you are saying "short up front, long out the back," well solid research has concluded that is faulty.

I agree! Many seem to think the higher the stroke rate and the higher the heart rate the better. Those simply indicate the higher the stress on the body and the quicker the injury or burnout.